


Karass

by storm_queen



Category: The Unusuals
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-16
Updated: 2012-12-16
Packaged: 2017-11-21 06:29:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,964
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/594530
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/storm_queen/pseuds/storm_queen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Delahoy has visitors after his surgery.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Karass

**Author's Note:**

  * For [](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts).



No one looks good in a hospital bed. No one looks strong, no one looks healthy, or even self-sufficient. It's something everyone knows in theory, but it's still hard to prepare for it. What’s more, you can feel the way you look, vulnerable and pale, pupils dilated.

It was only the knowledge that no one would come in and give him sympathy that made Delahoy agree to visitors in the first place. He didn’t think he could handle sympathy. But if he was letting people in, well, that would make him look good to Monica too, right? And he could let them all see that he was still himself. That nothing had changed. But even with the excuses, it took a strange kind of courage, different from putting on his gun and hitting the streets, and he wasn’t sure he had so much experience using this kind.

\---

It took almost as much courage for Banks to walk into Delahoy’s room. Of course, that wasn’t nearly as much courage as it took for him to walk into the hospital to begin with, even wearing his surgical mask and latex gloves. He paced in the parking lot for over half an hour before he finally stuffed his pockets with individual hand sanitizers and Clorox wipes and made it through the front door.

Delahoy was lying in the hospital bed, his back at a 45-degree angle, and he looked up, startled, as Banks walked into the room.

"So you, ah, you braved the petri dish to come see me?" he asked, voice betraying his surprise. "Or, wait, did you just get lost on your way to the biohazard unit?"

"Very funny," Banks answered. “Besides, two and a half more months, and I stop worrying about this shit.” He hoped he could believe that. Hoped that when the time came, if the time came, he wouldn’t be constantly looking over his shoulder, sure that if 42 wasn’t the year, it had to be 43. He glanced around the room, the whitewashed, enclosed space making him a little less rigid. The antiseptic smell was oddly comforting, and the only remotely dangerous things he could see were the remote controls and a vase of bright yellow daisies.

He cast a pointed glance at Delahoy's shaved, bandaged head. "You should really think about shaving the mustache, you know. You’re gonna look like you came out of a 70s porn flick."

"I'm not getting rid of years of carefully cultivated personality just because it makes you a little uncomfortable," Delahoy retorted. "Besides, it's my plainclothes look."

"You'd be better off brown baggin' it," Banks contradicted. The knot in his chest was loosening, just a little. This was still the last place in the world that he wanted to be, but the familiarity of the bickering was helping to offset the anxiety just a little. "But I see your point. Alvarez would be devastated."

"To say nothing of Monica." Delahoy wasn’t actually sure Monica had an opinion one way or another on his mustache - it was kind of hard to tell with her, sometimes - but he was also relatively sure that no one alive could fail to have a healthy respect for his facial hair.

"Where is Morticia, anyway? I thought she would be holding your hand."

"She's coming by after five. She has an interview in New Jersey." Delahoy kept his voice neutral, trying not to let his guilt over the situation come into play. Mustache or no, he was lucky Monica even agreed to talk to him again. And if he was being totally honest, that was the real reason he was lying here.

Banks grimaced and changed the subject hastily. "She send you the flowers? That's sweet."

"Ah, no, not exactly," Delahoy started, not really sure he wanted to have that conversation, but before he could finish, the door swung open to reveal Beaumont, Cole, and Shraeger.

"How ya feeling?" Shraeger asked, not waiting for a reply before walking over to the small table and depositing a greasy plastic bag with a takeout container. "We brought you the special, so... enjoy. Walsh wanted to be here, but he said to just go to town on the baby corn for him."

"I don't know if I can eat that much right now," Delahoy admitted, as much as it pained him to admit it. Then again, Apolo wasn't really any better quality than the hospital food, so he guessed it didn't matter either way. "Let me get the fortune cookie though?"

"You look like you’re the patient of the week on one of those medical dramas," Beaumont observed. "How's the head treating you?" Her voice was mocking, but she was watching Delahoy closely as Casey dug around inside the bag and pulled out the fortune cookie.

"It's fine. They, ah, they got me on the good drugs. The really addictive stuff," Delahoy explained. "This is the first time I've been awake all day. Don't feel much of anything." That wasn’t entirely true. His head was too heavy to lift from the pillow, even in his half-upright position, and he was pretty sure that if he tried, he would embarrass himself.

"I'm sure glad to hear that, Eric," Cole offered earnestly. "Amy and me, we've been praying for you every night. She's going to be so glad you pulled through okay."

"Yeah, I just want you to know, Bridget's been burning incense for you too," Banks put in quickly. "Every night. And making her own lavender massage oil, but that’s not for you.”

"Cut it out, Banks," Beaumont said, punching him in the arm hard enough for him to want to clap a hand over the spot. "Don't you have a dental cleaning to get to somewhere?"

"Hey, in case you didn't know, hospitals are like incubators for infectious diseases," Banks defended himself. "You're lucky that when you were in here, you didn't come back out with a staph infection. That sort of stuff happens here all the time."

"Yeah, or you could have come down with the plague," Delahoy added dryly, cracking the fortune cookie open and placing the two sides on his bedside tray.

"What does your fortune say?" Shraeger asked, leaning over his shoulder.

"'Your clear thinking is your greatest asset,'" Delahoy read aloud, and his chest tightened a little. "What the hell is that supposed to mean?"

"I guess it means the surgery was a success," Shraeger offered, shrugging. “Either that or you’re supposed to quit drinking.”

"On second thought, I did not need to hear that," Delahoy answered. He closed his eyes for a minute, feeling the pressure around his skull. “You sure know how to cheer a guy up.”

"Well, we're not going to keep you too much longer," Beaumont said smoothly, noticing the shift in Delahoy's attention. "Just wanted to make sure they hadn’t taken the jackass out of you along with the tumor. Get some rest and we'll see you back at the precinct soon, okay?"

"Yeah, your boyfriend wishes," Delahoy answered, knowing it was weak.

"We both wish," Shraeger said sincerely. "We're getting all the weird cases while you're out. Yesterday it was a guy with a gunshot wound who jumped out of a moving ambulance and ran off with $400 of medical equipment. Fun stuff."

“Hey, we’re the ones who had the perp putting Krazy Glue on the public toilet seats,” Beaumont pointed out, and everyone else winced at the thought. “Cole almost got himself bonded to one, too.”

“I did not!” Cole immediately protested. “And besides, it was my finger, not... not anywhere else!”

“Come to think of it, I definitely did not need the mental picture of that either,” Delahoy said, grimacing. “But, ah, thanks for the visit, you guys. Means a lot.”

“Yeah, means a lot, you guys, come again soon,” Banks said hastily, and began edging to where Beaumont stood, subtly leaning to the door.

"God put you on this earth, and you're still here for a reason, Eric," Cole said, patting the edge of the hospital bed awkwardly without actually touching Delahoy’s leg. "Don't you forget it."

“Thanks, Cole,” Delahoy said, at least as uncomfortably. And with that, the three detectives walked back out the door, leaving it propped open behind them.

“Well, that was nice of them,” Banks said. “Still, why would they bring you Apolo? You need a burger, man. None of the usual crap.”

“Really. I’m fine,” Delahoy said. As much as he liked the idea of a burger, he wasn’t going to be too interested in food unless he’d lost the side effect of everything tasting like dead meat.

“And speaking of presents,” Banks said, suspiciously crinkling eyes visible above his hospital mask.

“Leo, I’m tired,” Delahoy tried, but it had absolutely no effect on his partner.

“You’ve been sleeping for practically twenty-four hours. So you can wait a minute. Who are the flowers from?” Banks pressed.

“You know what, Leo, you’re right; they are from Monica,” Delahoy backpedaled, seeing his partner beginning to connect the dots.

“No, I don’t think so,” Banks countered, and Delahoy could almost hear the smug grin in his voice. “Those really don’t look like girlfriend flowers. And they came with popcorn, not chocolate.”

“Let it never be said that Eddie Alvarez does not know how to take a hint,” came a voice from the doorway. “Last time we had a detective in the hospital, every single one of my muffins got put in the break room. So I hope this solves that little problem.”

“Thanks for the gift, Eddie. It means a lot,” Delahoy said, fixing a death glare on Banks.

“Yeah, well, you’re one of our own,” Alvarez said, blissfully unaware of Banks pressing a fist to his surgical mask and shaking on the other side of the room. “And like I told Allison, Eddie Alvarez doesn’t really do emotions. He’s... more of a lone wolf, and I know you are too.” He nodded seriously at Delahoy. “Solidarity.”

“Yeah, Eddie, thanks again,” Delahoy said. “I, ah, I can’t remember the last time somebody bought me flowers.” It was totally honest, but he delivered the sentence in a deadpan voice he thought his partner might appreciate.

Sure enough, at that point Banks lost it, exhaling with a high-pitched squeak and leaning against the wall for support.

“What’s the matter with him?” Alvarez asked, jerking his head in Banks’s direction.

“Leo’s... he’s, ah, really broken up about the surgery,” Delahoy said. “I think it hit him a little close to home, you know?”

“I completely understand,” Alvarez said, nodding solemnly. “Well, have a speedy recovery. I’ll give the two of you some time.”

“Not one word,” Delahoy warned as Alvarez’s footsteps sounded down the hall, but it didn’t matter. Banks was still trying to catch his breath, and couldn’t have said anything if he had wanted to.

“And for the record,” Delahoy added, “at least Alvarez gave me something. And the other guys chipped in for Chinese. Where’s your bedside manner?”

“You want me to send you flowers?” Banks asked finally. “Because if you do, I’m not the one making us sound gay anymore.” He let out another snicker.

“Yeah, that’s kind of a lost cause at this point,” Delahoy said, closing his eyes again. “Even Monica thinks so.”

“Well, I’ll head out then,” Banks said. “Don’t want your girlfriend getting jealous.”

He paused at the door. “Eric?”

“Yeah?” Delahoy asked, not opening his eyes.

“I’m glad you made it, man.” And he was. Not just because of the part of him that wondered whether every day Eric Delahoy was still on the books, it meant he had a chance too. But because Delahoy was his partner, and the only one he would want.

“Yeah,” Eric agreed. “Me, too.”

**Author's Note:**

> Many thanks to hoktauri for allowing me to probe the show's most frustrating cliffhanger, explore Eric Delahoy's karass, and engage in my bromance OTP. I hope you enjoy it!
> 
> Many, many thanks are also due to my supportive and helpful betas, without whom the fic would have been deeply illogical.


End file.
